Broken Clocks
by Vixere
Summary: Anthea viciously betrays Mycroft by taking maternity leave, and Mycroft is forced to hire a replacement assistant - one Miss Persephone Jones. It soon comes to pass that Jones is chaotic, insubordinate, and bizarrely attractive. They eat pasta and fall in love. (Art by tillieke.)
1. South London Slattern

**Broken Clocks**

_**by Vixere**_

* * *

"You're _what?!_"

"_Pregnant_, Mycroft. Pregnant." Anthea Hughes, his long-suffering assistant and second-in-command, said in a tone of utter bemusement. She took her time flipping her perfectly coiffed hair behind her shoulder (which she knew very well annoyed her employer greatly) before she finally deigned to carry on speaking. "Just shy of twelve weeks along."

He should have guessed, he thought savagely. Yesterday for lunch she had a scotch egg slathered with sriracha hot sauce - hardly a conventional choice, and not the type of thing Mycroft Holmes would usually miss.

"_How_?" He burst, irritated beyond belief.

Anthea's eyebrow quirked. "You _do _know about the birds and the bees, don't you, sir?"

"Of course I do." He snapped. "I'm not _Sherlock_, Hughes."

"That much is abundantly clear, sir." Anthea said cooly, crossing her legs over and leaning back in the plush fanback armchair to survey him. Mycroft hated when she did that; it was as though she imagined herself his equal. A wholly preposterous thought.

Mycroft's hand rested on the arm of his own chair, which was significantly more grand than the one Anthea occupied. It was highly polished, intricately carved Victorian rosewood with fastidiously maintained dark grey plush upholstery, and dated back to the mid-nineteenth century.

Mycroft was not inclined towards frivolous expenditure, but he rather thought that £30,000 was a small price to pay to remind each and every visitor to his office exactly how much he outranked them by without having to say a single word.

Chair superiority aside, however, Mycroft was having a difficult day. He was at a loss as to how Anthea Hughes - who was undoubtedly his star employee despite any minor irritation she caused - had let this _happen_.

"I simply don't understand how you could do this to me. We're in the middle of a national election, not to mention the Rome situation…"

"My ovaries wait for no election." Anthea cut him off with a ring of finality. It was a testament to the good credit that Anthea had built up over her years of service that Mycroft allowed this small act of defiance to pass without rebuke. "You knew this was a possibility. Andrew and I…"

"Yes, yes. I know how you two have been carrying on." He said dismissively, nose wrinkling in mild disgust. "Getting married and all sorts of _human_ nonsense."

"Quite." Anthea's lip quirked. "We were sorry not to see you at the wedding, incidentally. I would've hoped that eight years of dedicated service would've merited a drop-in, at least."

Mycroft did not feel the need to explain that even one hundred years of dedicated service would have yielded the same disappointing result. He didn't _do _weddings.

He had instructed Anthea to send herself a gift on his behalf, and had provided a generous budget for its purchase.

He was at a genuine loss as to why that hadn't satisfied her.

Mycroft knew he was facing defeat. Though his powers of persuasion were considerable, he could hardly talk his most invaluable employee out of being pregnant when she had so knowingly and willfully conspired to bring the state about.

"You have a leave plan?" He asked tiredly, at length.

"My replacement." Anthea slid a worryingly thin dossier across the desk. "I've set aside two months to train her up for you, then she'll be on her own."

"I suppose she comes highly recommended?" He picked up the file and began to peruse the meagre information it contained.

"Not really." Anthea sniffed. "She's inexperienced, poor, and a bit annoying, to be honest."

"I can see why you were so compelled to offer her a triple-figure, once-in-a-lifetime government contract." His voice was dripping with irony. "I'm sure her brief tenure as a…" he paused to read "_research assistant_… has appropriately equipped her for the unrelenting pressure of managing the fallout of international geopolitical crises, or routinely setting up meetings with the highest authorities in the country…"

"I'm sure she's perfectly capable of sending a calendar invite and answering a phone, sir. It hasn't taken much more than that to deal with the last three geopolitical crises, if you recall."

"...not to mention helping me keep an eye on Baker Street while simultaneously assisting me as I run the whole bloody British Government single-handedly." Mycroft concluded dryly, frowning at the resume in his hand as though it had done him mortal offence.

"I keep having to remind you." Anthea smirked. "It's not _single-handedly_ if you have help."

Mycroft scoffed at her cheek, but offered no rebuke. Anthea Hughes had dedicated the better part of a decade to the role. There was no denying it. She had become nigh indispensable to him.

How, then, was he now supposed to dispense with her now?

His eyes ghosted over the name printed at the top of the resume, widening in incredulity as his mouth formed the offending words. "_Persephone Jones_?"

Anthea shrugged. "It's a name."

"It's ridiculous. _She's_ ridiculous."

"You don't know that." Anthea rationalised. "You only know that her parents are ridiculous. And that's hardly _her_ fault."

Mycroft conceded this point, thinking briefly of his own highly absurd parents. They had been inflicted upon him for an entire month last summer, and Sherlock had been no help occupying them.

He shuddered as he remembered the long matinee plays and the infuriating, ambling walks through every gallery in Westminster.

It had been almost too much to bear, acting as though he didn't already know every artwork intimately. He could do the Tate in thirty minutes if left to his own devices, but mother had taken a whole four hours, crooning over every brushstroke she saw.

It had driven him to chain smoking. Again.

"I owe her sister a favour." Anthea said vaguely, skimming over this statement quickly enough to spark Mycroft's interest. "Give her a month. That's all I ask."

"Fine."

"If she's rubbish, you can always let the recruiters find someone."

Mycroft scoffed.

"_Recruiters_." His nose wrinkled in abhorrence. "The modern slave trade, you mean."

Anthea shrugged. "She's my recommendation. She's rough around the edges, you know city girls." Anthea frowned in momentary distaste.

Mycroft rolled his eyes, of course he'd end up with some grimy, South London slattern as an assistant.

"But she's only got to last a year. Then I'll be back." His soon-to-be former assistant concluded brightly, swinging out of her chair abruptly to leave.

It irked him that _she _was terminating their meeting instead of waiting to be dismissed, but his mind was too overladen with visions of some bumbling, faceless hippie girl to bother chastising her.

_Just a year. And then everything will be as it was before._

It was a comforting thought.

"Fine."

* * *

Persephone didn't know why, but it always started with a total psychological breakdown.

When Guthrie had told her about his torrid, months-long affair with the lactation consultant at St Bartholomew's, she didn't even have it within her to be angry.

She had folded in upon herself.

She had wept into a pint of Waitrose raspberry trifle ice cream, bingeing old episodes of Eastenders which she'd been pathetic enough to purchase on DVD (she'd never known someone to _pay_ for Eastenders, but such were the fathomless depths of her heartbreak).

She had sat cross-legged, eyes red-rimmed and puffy, on the floor in front of her lumpy, misshapen couch.

"I don't see why you sit on the cold floor when you have a perfectly functional sofa _right there_." Her sister, Medea, had said while scoffing down a packet of crisps from her perch on the kitchen counter.

Her voice carried easily, there was no pretending she hadn't 's flat was the size of a postage stamp and almost everything it contained was damaged, second-hand or covered in dust.

The dust could easily be addressed, but Persephone had barely moved beyond the triangle of her fridge, bed and television in weeks.

It had happened before, this melancholy of hers. Years had passed without an episode, but Persephone remembered very well that last time had been… bad.

That's why Medea had flown over, she supposed.

"_Sofa_," Persephone repeated scornfully in between mouthfuls of ice cream. "You've spent too much time around Americans, sister. Call it a lounge. Call it a couch. Speak proper."

"Pfft." Medea scoffed. "_Speak proper._ You're such a little gutter rat, and you don't even know it."

Persephone sent her sister an irate glare. "When are you due to leave me, anyway?"

"I have a flight to DC on Tuesday." Medea replied airily. "It's just enough time for me to get you settled in your new job." She grinned and hopped down from the counter, as Persephone groaned.

"Dea, I told you _no_." Persephone said emphatically, letting herself collapse onto her side in a slightly dramatic fashion. She pulled the blanket she was cocooned in over her head, which muffled her voice when she next spoke. "No favours. No _jobs_."

"You've been out of work for three months now." Medea carried on without reference to her protests, plucking the blanket away and scrambling out of reach before Persephone could snatch it back. "I know it sucks that your study got shut down, that the public interest isn't there right now. Funding wars can be a bitch, Seph. I know. But you can't wallow around forever letting the bills pile up."

"I've got savings." Persephone said vaguely, frowning at her sister.

"And I'm sure you're burning through them faster than a toupee in a hurricane."

Persephone ignored her sister's absurd turn-of-phrase. She'd been like this since university, when she'd first discovered stand-up nights and theatre clubs.

"It's not like I'm renting. I own this garbage flat, you know."

"This garbage flat will be on the market before the year is out if you don't get your act together."

"_Dea-_"

"_Seph-_" Medea crouched down and held Persephone by the shoulder, looking into her eyes with a worried expression. "I'm just concerned, love. It isn't like you to go to pieces over a man, or to mope about without a project."

"I'm hardly _known _for my work ethic, Dea."

"Oh you're lazy as all sin when it comes to academia, I've no notion of how you would have gotten into research if you weren't just naturally clever." Medea said with a hint of exasperation. "But even when you're shirking your responsibilities you're usually doing _something _on the side - watercolour painting or cooking lessons or krav maga…"

"Krav maga was a mistake." Persephone nodded solemnly as she remembered her few painful sessions attempting to master the art of self-defence. "But okay, sure. I admit I've slowed down a bit."

Medea raised her eyebrows. "Slowed down? That's the understatement of the century. You've stopped completely. You're stuck in the mud and you're sinking further down every day - I can _see _it, Seph."

Though it certainly felt that way to Persephone, she wasn't about to admit it to her sister.

She turned her face away as her cheeks stung with shame. She hadn't meant for it to get this bad… And she certainly hadn't meant for her only halfway-sane relative to fly halfway across the globe because of it.

"Please, _please _just give the job a chance." Medea said pleadingly, hands still firmly clutching Persephone's shoulders, forcing her to confront her sister's earnest expression. "You know my old schoolmate Anthea? It's her maternity leave contract, some weirdo government role which she could tell me exactly nothing about, but the pay is _crazy _good. Doesn't that sound nice and mysterious?"

Persephone suspected that Anthea had never liked her very much, and it made her reticent to accept a favour from the intimidatingly well put-together woman.

But even she wasn't immune to the prospect of crazy money and the chance to learn sensitive national secrets.

"Yes." She heard herself say. "Okay, fine. I'll give it a go."

Medea squealed and flung her arms around her properly, knocking the breath out of her as they rolled on the floor in a tangle of limbs and laughter.

"Gerroff! Off, you berk!"

"I'm so proud of you, Sephie!" Medea singsonged, tickling Persephone's ribs and making her struggle harder. "You won't regret this! Promise!"

_Bloody siblings_. Persephone thought, though she couldn't help the smile that spread across her face as she thought of how much Medea had done for her.

* * *

**A/N**: How are we feeling about Mycroft's characterisation? Do we like Persephone?


	2. Snowballing

**Broken Clocks**

_**by Vixere**_

* * *

A cold silence laid thick upon the room. Mycroft was in his chair, rigid-backed and glowering down at his prey.

Persephone Jones was young - _too young_ \- he thought irritably. Somewhere in the region of twenty-five, give or take a few months. His eyes slid over her and he sought to deduce every single ounce of information he could.

She was wearing a navy frock which skimmed her knees and had sleeves that ended at her delicate wrists. The material clung to her ample figure and had as low a neckline as anyone would dare sport in the current environment.

It wasn't a new dress; Mycroft knew just from looking at it that it had remained crumpled in the back of her armoire until only recently.

_Low income. Unaccustomed to the status of this locale and role. Reasonably aware of her own sexual viability._ He itemised his findings quickly before moving on.

_The eyes… _There was some near-imperceptible redness clinging to her waterline. A recent breakup. Long term relationship. Two years? No, one and a half, obviously. And she was short-sighted, that much was apparent. But she didn't have a prescription for glasses. Was this a choice borne of vanity or tight finances?

He surveyed the state of her shoes. Black heels, wholly appropriate for the setting, except for the fact that they were scuffed and old. _Finances then_, he concluded.

He surmised by the tightness in her jaw and shoulders that she was already having misgivings about being here. She seemed determined, however, to make a go of things. Probably because of the sister. He could tell by the rings she wore that they must be close - at least three had been gifted by a female relative and the style of them was too youthful to implicate a maternal figure.

Not close with the mother, then. He stared hard at her. No, he had thought as much when he had read her resume. There had been hints, albeit small ones. Were they estranged, he wondered?

Not quite, he quickly concluded with a swift glance at her handbag (a good-quality vintage hand-me-down which almost certainly _was _from her mother). But there was resistance there, some emotional distance which couldn't be easily traversed.

He was struck, then, by a rather peculiar and unwelcome thought.

_She is utterly beautiful_.

Her ashy brown hair spilled over her shoulders and down her back in gentle waves. She had made no effort to tie it back, and Mycroft privately thought that the current look suited her, anyway.

She had a clear, peaches-and-cream complexion which allowed the natural, youthful rosiness of her cheeks to shine through. Mycroft noted from some micro-scarring on her chin that she must have had adolescent acne, though that seemed entirely unimportant now.

She was tall, too. He had noticed when she'd walked in - six feet, he estimated. But not terribly slender. The lines of her body were soft and curved and rounded.

To him it was striking and glamorous, though he imagined other men might not find her to their preference. Decidedly _not _petite.

And her eyes - aside from holding within them the unmistakable vestiges of a recent heartbreak - were a deep, fathomless brown circled with the faintest ring of honey gold…

He twitched, barely curtailing the expression of self-disgust that threatened to overtake his features. He was repulsed by his own thoughts. _What on earth was he doing? _

Waxing poetical about a schoolgirl, even within the privacy of his own mind, was _not _in Mycroft Holmes' playbook.

He returned to himself and saw sat before him a prettyish girl with brown hair and brown eyes, her too-tall, too-fat figure swathed in old, crumpled clothes.

He felt his chest ease a little.

It had been a glitch. Even the most brilliant computers - and his brain was the most brilliant computer that mankind had seen in many years - had glitches now and then. It was nothing to be concerned with.

All these deductions - as well as his entirely unwanted mental detour - had taken under a second. The girl was completely ignorant to the thorough one-over to which she had been subjected.

Anthea, however, had experience in these matters. She stood by the girl's shoulder and cast him a warning look. _Play nice,_ she mouthed.

He resolved to ignore her entirely.

He glanced perfunctorily at the file in his hands, her credentials and the results of her background check, as though he had not already memorised the information entirely. "You were previously employed as a research assistant...?"

"Yes." She said quickly, clearly aiming to impress with her promptness. "At the University of London, where I did my undergraduate studies."

She spoke in a sort of lazy, unstructured lilt. She flattened her vowels too much.

_Terrible elocution._ He thought condemningly. _Then again, she is an alum of the University of London, not of Oxford or Cambridge. I mustn't be surprised by these shortcomings. Anthea did call her a city girl, after all. _

"What manner of research? What discipline?" He fired off more questions quickly, privately hoping to destabilise her.

"I did a postgraduate thesis two years ago on various drug cultures in Southwest London and worked up a research proposal based on that paper. It was a joint study between the School of Anthropology and the School of Public Health Sciences and was co-funded as such. It was then picked up by the NHS as a minor project and converted into a survey on using habits among people who inject drugs." She replied seamlessly, seemingly unperturbed by his rapid-fire interrogation. "I coordinated the collection of data across six boroughs during that time."

He was unwillingly impressed, though the work held no relevance to what they aimed to achieve here. She was sharper than he had expected, however.

_No._ He told himself firmly. He would not - under any circumstances - be won over by this utterly, wildly, _painfully _ordinary girl.

When he spoke again, his tone was cold as ice.

"And how did you recruit participants for this survey?"

It was an incisive question - no, it was a great deal more than that.

It was conversational surgery. He was determined to extract every shortcoming from this girl; she was an intruder, she did not belong here, in his office, in his world.

The girl shifted in her seat, clearly ill at ease. Privately, he triumphed.

After a fashion, however, she fixed her gaze upon him and he was mildly surprised to find her eyes burning with defiance, her mouth set in a hard line.

"Snowballing." She said tightly.

"_Snowballing_." He repeated scornfully, having known the answer before she'd ever said it. He stared at her coldly. He would be the ice to her fire, he would extinguish her completely.

It wouldn't even be difficult; he was sure of it.

"You mean to say; you spent your time rubbing shoulders with drug addicts and degenerates in back alleys and squats for the sake of _research_?"

To her credit, she did not waver, shooting daggers at him with those dark eyes which he refused to be beguiled by. He stared right back, unnaturally still.

For a moment, nobody in the room dared breathe. Anthea looked as though she might come over faint from the tension, though that may have just been the gestational diabetes she'd been unfortunate enough to develop.

"I imagine that it's easier for some to convince themselves that they can gain an understanding of the world from behind a fortress of textbooks," the girl eventually said, voice dripping with irony, "but I have always preferred truth and reality over bullshit."

It was not the answer he was expecting. He blinked, and then immediately cursed himself for the miniscule reaction. He was impressed - grudgingly impressed - with this (_mildly_) clever, crude, ungovernable girl.

_Though ungovernable and crude hardly makes for a good subordinate. _

He leaned back in his chair and contemplated her for a moment, already knowing full well what he wanted to say. He was going to make her wait, though.

The ringing silence persisted, and Mycroft noted with some satisfaction that her shoulders were once again tensing under the pressure of his steady gaze.

"There will be a two-month probation period, while Anthea mentors you." He said finally. "Should you last that long you will be expected to perform to the same exemplary standard as the rest of my staff. Misconduct, or consistent failure to meet outcomes, will result in immediate dismissal."

She nodded silently. She did not thank him.

He wanted to be annoyed by it, but instead he was struck by a bizarre urge to laugh. He quashed it, frowning.

"Dismissed." He waited until she had reached the door before he made his parting comment. "By the way, Miss Jones, do endeavour to behave in a more ladylike manner while you are in my employ. You are, after all, representing the British nation."

Her head turned back towards him, and he saw with satisfaction that her jaw was clenched in anger. She nodded curtly and left.

He smirked. Perhaps this would be more enjoyable than he first imagined.

* * *

"_How was it?"_ Even down the phone, Medea's voice was full of eagerness and excitement. "_Oh, tell me everything!_"

"Horrible." Persephone replied. "It was _horrible_, Medea. My boss - _Mr Holmes _\- already hates me. I've no idea why he's even giving me the job. Anthea must have some crazy amount of swing there, and she must owe _you _big time, because seriously, that was less of a meet-and-greet and more of an interrogation."

"_Oh well_." Medea sighed down the line. "_Try not to get too hung up on it. He might warm up, you know. Thea said he's a great boss, once you get onto the right side of him_."

"I doubt he has a right side." Persephone muttered. "When's your plane leaving?"

"_Ten minutes. I'd better go."_ Medea's voice was regretful, and Persephone could hear a call to board in the background. "_I'll miss you, sis_."

"I'll miss you too." Persephone murmured, leaning against a lamppost and trying to ignore the lump in her throat as she wondered how long it would be until she saw Medea again. "Say hi to the President for me, will you?"

Medea laughed. "_Sure thing. Love you!_"

"Love you too." Persephone said quietly and hung up with heavy heart.

* * *

**A/N**: They meet! They spar! It begins!


	3. Insubordination

Mycroft liked to walk home sometimes.

At present his days were dominated by short trips in black cars with tinted windows, shuffling in and out of historic buildings to coerce and rub shoulders the way that only he could. It was busier than usual. An underling ― previously Anthea but now Persephone ― would organise lunch to be brought to his office. He spent hours at a time pouring over emails and news reports - effectively taking the pulse of the free world. When things were like this Mycroft could go days without doing more than a few hundred steps.

So when it ended ― when the Prime Minister of Bhutan _finally _agreed to play nicely with Nepal again and work held the promise of returning to its usual pace ― Mycroft found that there was nothing he would rather do than stretch his legs. It wasn't more than a fifteen-minute walk home, anyway.

He called his driver and let them know of the change in plans, retrieved his coat from the wall and smoothed down the vest of his three-piece. He needn't look like an animal just because he would be walking the streets among the commoners, after all.

Stepping out onto Downing Street, however, Mycroft found himself faced with a rather unexpected scene ― and at the centre of it was his newest employee.

Miss Jones stood facing a couple ― a pale man and a dark-haired woman ― cheeks flushed and arms crossed, looking altogether terribly uncomfortable.

Mycroft was swift about making his deductions.

_The ex boyfriend, obviously. Former hockey player, suffered a career-ending injury no less than six years ago. A particularly bad tear of the anterior cruciate ligament. German ancestry going by his colouring, but no active connections to the Mutterland to speak of. Medical professional, probably at St. Bartholomew's given the current locale. A doctor of paediatrics, most likely, given the novelty pen sticking out of his pocket. No doubt he used it to distract children from all manner of nasty jabs. _

As for the woman…

_New girlfriend, that was evident from the body language alone, he hardly needed acknowledge the presence of a heart-shaped pendant around her neck, a new addition clearly purchased by the gentleman holding her around the waist. A six-month anniversary gift, which doubled conveniently as a 'I finally broke up with my actual girlfriend' present. Infidelity had caused the break-up, then. She was wearing her grey-blue scrubs, so, a nurse of some sort. No, scratch that, she was better placed in midwifery. She didn't appear deliver babies regularly, however, and she certainly didn't work shifts. A consultant of some sort, then. Lactation, perhaps. Or else a diabetic nurse. _

As Mycroft watched on the man let out an uneasy laugh, and the woman offered Miss Jones a pained smile.

"Fancy seeing you here, Seph." The man said, his voice cracking slightly.

Persephone's arms remained crossed and she glared at the man. "Don't call me Seph."

Mycroft allowed himself to feel some amusement at the stony expression on his new assistant's face. One needn't be Mycroft Holmes to see her humiliation at running into the happy couple in public.

But one _was _Mycroft Holmes. And Mycroft Holmes had just endured a particularly busy week of work.

Now, it was time for play.

"C'mon, Sephie, I know things didn't go great guns at the end, but we've always been good mates, haven't we? I'm really sorry about how it went. Me and Lydia, both. Right, hun?"

For her part, Lydia did nod quite earnestly. Her conflicted expression told Mycroft that the gentleman had acted as the architect of their deceit, whereas she had just been swept up in the no doubt thrilling romance which he noted was painfully redolent of many a medical drama. She was, perhaps, guilty of being too weak to deny him, but Mycroft would expect no less of somebody with fingernails like that.

_Coward's nails, if ever I saw them. _It was plain as day. He wondered how people ever managed to get by ignoring that which was so blatantly obvious.

"I don't think it matters if you feel bad, Guthrie." Persephone said with a surprising measure of control. "What's done is done."

"No ― look ― we should catch up. I'm dying to hear about your new job, not to mention get the final results from your study. Did you have time to wrap up in the end? Before this gig started?"

"No, I didn't have time, I was foisted from my office like an old printer and told that my work didn't matter anymore. There was no _wrap up_."

"Oh…" The man ― Guthrie ― seemed to struggle to find something to say at this. "Well, at least you've landed on your feet? Quincy had it from Medea that you were doing admin or something."

Mycroft observed with fascination how very close Persephone came to physically lunging at Guthrie. She was ― of course ― in no position to correct him. She couldn't talk about the actual nature of her role. If those in her extended circle thought she was a simple secretary, all the better.

Mycroft was pleased to see that even though she was unaware of his presence, she restrained herself from correcting the unfaithful doctor.

She merely grimaced and shrugged. Defeated.

For some reason, that irked him.

She, who in the space of three weeks had demonstrated a near-unassailable sense of determination. She, who had met every single one of his attempts to destabilise her with taciturn indifference. She, who had brought him the wrong coffee every day as an enduring act of resistance ― _she _was defeated in the face of these utterly average imbeciles?

It was beyond the pale.

It took him less than three seconds to formulate a plan of attack.

"Jones." He walked down the steps towards the trio, who all turned to face him ― apparently grateful for an excuse to look anywhere but at each other. "You serve the highest echelons of the British nation now, I would appreciate if you didn't associate yourself with..." he made sure to pause and sneer, "_the_ _great unwashed_."

Guthrie's pale face flushed with indignation, and next to him Lydia frowned in her displeasure. Persephone, however, grinned almost wolfishly at the pair. When she caught his gaze, her eyes were sparkling with mirth. Mycroft felt the slightest twinge somewhere in the region of his heart, but chose not to dwell on this.

"Right you are, Sir."

"Is this guy for real?" Guthrie burst, glaring at Mycroft with every sign of utter hatred. Mycroft took a moment to relish it. "_The great unwashed?_"

"I assure you that I am indeed real."

Guthrie glared, still rather flustered at the interruption. "Who the hell are you?"

"The question is, rather, who are you?" Mycroft said lightly, twirling his umbrella as he gave Guthrie another cursory one-over. "I have enough context to assume that you're the sort of living pond-scum who believes it a bright idea to romance two women at once. I say romance quite intentionally, by the way. You weren't just looking for another source of casual sex when you strayed from my employee's arms, oh no, you were addicted to the very process of beguiling a woman into falling in love with you. Hearing those words for the first time all over again. It's rather addictive, isn't it? I give you about four months before the novelty of _this_ one wears off. Be sure not to bother Jones here when that happens. No doubt your separation from this young lady will coincide with a rather earth-shattering revelation regarding your old partner's virtues. It's tragically predictable. Also, you're blocking the pathway for pedestrians. Loitering in front of Number 10 Downing Street hardly seems innocuous. You are clearly not tourists. I would move on before you are encouraged to do so by more unpleasant means."

Guthrie made to speak several times, his mouth opening and closing repeatedly with little success. After a moment he achieved little more than a spluttering noise.

Persephone, he noted, looked on in great amusement. She was practically beaming in her smugness.

Feeling that he had achieved his goal in rescuing his new employee ― who he admitted to himself he had decided not to hate ― from certain social defeat at the hands of the obnoxious couple, Mycroft turned his attention to them once more.

"Now, if you could please remove yourself and the poor, sad idiot who has seen fit to fall in love with you from my sight, I would very much appreciate it. Calling security from inside the building always generates _such _a fuss."

That about did it. Both Lydia and Guthrie were spurred into action, hurrying down the street and shooting alarmed, furtive glances over their shoulders as they went. Mycroft allowed himself a small, satisfied smile.

Persephone had her hands in her pockets and was looking at him in a way he would almost characterise as bashful.

"That was brilliant, sir."

Trying not to be too self-satisfied, Mycroft chose to ignore this compliment. "Back to work, Jones."

Persephone chuckled. "The day's over, you know."

"Well, then, go home."

"Aye, aye, Captain." She grinned, lifting her fingers in a mock-salute which he didn't entirely hate. "I will of course be going home via the pub. Care to join me?"

He actually scoffed at this.

"Certainly not."

There were favours, and then there were _favours_. He allowed himself the luxury of enjoying the girl - she was entertaining in her own scrappy sort of way. Hardier than he had expected, certainly. But he would not bear the indignity of being seen in a public house just for a few more hours of exposure to her particularly unusual brand of obnoxious resilience.

For her part, Persephone did not appear wholly surprised by his response. She merely ducked her head, still grinning, and said; "Goodnight, sir."

Mycroft allowed his eyes to follow her as she disappeared into the crowd. He wondered vaguely if she was meeting up with friends. Did she have a safe means of getting home? Before he had time to talk himself out of it, Mycroft had pulled out his phone a typed out a message.

_Goodnight Jones. MH. _

And then;

_Text when you have arrived home safely, please. No matter the hour. MH._

It was not until nearly midnight, when he was reclining in his armchair nursing a glass of whisky and rereading Wilkie Collins' _The Woman in White_ that Mycroft heard his phone chime.

_Safe. PJ. _

As he was staring at the solitary word his phone whooshed, a second message appearing underneath the first;

_Shame you didn't come out, Sir. There was dancing. PJ. _

Mycroft allowed himself a sharp intake of breath at Persephone's cheek, but found quite curiously that he wasn't all that angry. In fact, as he returned his attention to his novel, he did so with the barest smirk tracing his lips. He allowed himself the final word, typing out one last message for the evening;

_Insubordination. MH. _


	4. The Knitting Incident

_September 5th_

"You dance how I would expect somebody who reads peer-reviewed journal articles for leisure to dance."

Persephone scowled at her friend, Quincy Reed. Quincy was a Bloke. Capitalised. He frequently could be found 'on the lash', or 'chasing birds'. Optimally, he would be doing both at the same time ("More efficient that way, Seph. I'm a busy man.")

Even so, Quincy had been her mate since University. He could always be relied upon for laughter, dancing and scintillatingly harsh banter at his own expense (and, as was increasingly the case lately, at hers). And really, good fun and levity encompassed the vast majority of what Persephone really, truly enjoyed in life.

And so even though Persephone had only seen Quincy last night, she was happy to find herself nursing her hangover in his company.

Brunch was their tradition. Blinis were their antidote.

"That is rude."

"It's the truth. You dance like you were home-schooled."

Persephone turned over her phone in her hands before unlocking it for the millionth time and scanning her messages — a single word, _Insubordination_, flashed across the screen. She'd stared at that word for what felt like hours, but it had offered her no answers. "I think I'm flirting with my boss."

Quincy wrinkled his nose in distaste. "Well that's… really fucking dumb of you."

She paused, and then continued lightly, as though commenting on the weather; "I'm pretty sure he's flirting back."

"Still dumb, though I suppose it's better than getting done for workplace sexual harassment." Quincy seemed to retreat into his thoughts for a moment, before asking; "Isn't he like, really old and important?"

"Yes, he is both of those things." She scratched her nose. "He is also quite mean."

"_Duuuuumb_." Quincy downed his blini in one. "God, you're so stupid for a smart person."

Privately feeling that Quincy was absolutely right, Persephone shoved her phone into her pocket. She was not going to obsess over a single, potentially-flirty word, even if that word had come from _the _Mycroft Holmes. She needed to be better than that. She had to stay strong and refuse his advances, if they came.

Quincy was right, she did not want to be That Sort of girl.

* * *

_September 7th _

Persephone needn't have worried about rebuffing anybody's sexual advances, as the end of her next shift of work saw her standing before Mycroft Holmes at the office exit, arms full of knitting gear and a comically alarmed expression on her face.

She had been trying to sneak out, you see. Before anybody noticed, or, god forbid, asked _questions _about the bundles of yarn and the giant knitting needles and the shoddy, half-finished scarf that she was just barely keeping grasp of.

Everybody was supposed to have _left_, already. But yet here he was, the very last person she wanted to see her like this.

_I really should bring a bag for this stuff. _

Persephone scowled at the thought. It was entirely too late for her brain to attempt being helpful.

Mycroft's eyes - ever sharp and critical - travelled from the ball of yarn in her hands, up to her face, and then back down again. He frowned.

He looked completely disturbed.

Persephone waved the yarn weakly in front of her face. "I've decided to learn how to knit."

Mycroft looked completely exasperated, his eyebrows raised in alarm at her shameful confession. "_Why_?"

Persephone could only shrug. "I like having projects."

Mycroft shook his head, apparently appalled. "Is your current project intended to transform yourself into a ninety-year-old German widow? Because even my grandmother was too good for knitting."

"I wasn't really asking for feedback." Persephone paused thoughtfully, brow furrowed. "Why German?"

"Knitting is very popular in Germany." Mycroft said mildly, before waving off the apparently stupid question. "Why don't you just take up pub trivia, or, I don't know, _lawn bowls_, like a normal person? You _are _one of those, aren't you? Though your present state does indicate a preference for bingo, you shrivelled old maid."

Persephone blushed and shot a weak glare at her employer. "_Really_, sir! Is this necessary?"

"Do you know how wildly inefficient this is?" Mycroft continued as though there had been no interruption. "The soul-rending monotony it would require to create a pair of socks is enough to single-handedly inspire the industrial revolution, no doubt. This is precisely why human beings invented the production line. So that we didn't have to waste our lives _knitting_."

"It's for _fun_." Persephone argued. "I have to fill my time somehow, okay?"

"You have a _job_, Jones. You have precious little spare time to attract a mate and maintain favourable friendships with other humans._ You-do-not-have-time-to-knit_."

"'_Other humans_?'" Her eyes widened, aghast at his assessment of her prospects. "_Attract a mate?!_"

"Well you can hardly call upon Gerald to father your children, and you only have about fifteen fertile years left. And that's a generous estimate."

"_Guthrie_." Persephone corrected through grit teeth.

Mycroft all but rolled his eyes, as though he were speaking to a very slow child. "It doesn't _matter _what his name is, Jones. He's yesterday's sperm."

"We cannot possibly be having this conversation."_ I can't believe that only forty-eight hours ago I thought we were text-flirting and now we are talking about me acquiring viable sperm for my shrivelled old ovaries. _

"Why not? I can tell from the ludicrous socks you're wearing today that you want children, though heaven knows _why_. Is securing a mate not your highest priority? How else will you produce an unwashed brat to continue your unremarkable genetic legacy?"

Persephone couldn't help but scoff, and - resigned at last to the fact that _yes, this is happening_ \- placed her knitting gear down on a nearby desk. "No. Jesus. Of course it isn't my highest priority. Someday, sure. I'd love to have kids. But I'm not _husband-hunting_, for christssake. I am not so desperate."

Mycroft sighed piteously, looking at her as though she were a lost cause. "That is a mistake. You should adjust your attitude or else all of the good husbands will be gone." He paused, and then added; "You need the extra time, too, given that you have such abominable taste."

"This is not an appropriate workplace conversation!" Persephone squeaked, face reddening. This had to be, hands down, the most humiliating exchange of her life (and she had been broken up with in a Tesco's, once).

"You're at the peak of your sexual viability and you shouldn't waste-"

"_Mycroft_!"

* * *

_November 25th _

Persephone tried not to think too much on the utter folly she had displayed in ever imagining her mad, impossible boss had been flirting with her. After the Knitting Incident, Persephone and Mycroft had fallen comfortably into mild professionalism. They barely ever spoke about anything that didn't pertain directly to the task at hand, and there had been absolutely _no _out-of-hours texts since what Persephone was calling 'Insubordinationgate'.

Today, however, it couldn't escape Persephone's notice that Mycroft was _nervous_. He did not seem to be able to comfortably ignore her in silence as they were chauffeured to their next appointment (which had become his daily custom over the past month-and-a-half since the Knitting Incident).

He was shifting in his seat. He crossed his ankle over his knee, and then planted his feet back on the floor, before crossing his legs over again. And Persephone was sure she heard him _clicking his tongue_ in agitation when they passed Oxford Circus.

She only knew the address of their destination - 221B Baker Street. Only Persephone didn't know _why_ they were going there. Mycroft always told her who they were meeting in advance - usually to provide her with the opportunity to hastily research lest she make a total fool of herself - _again_, that is. ("For the last time, I didn't know we still _had _Baronets in Great Britain.")

She dared to broach the restless silence that stretched taut between them. "You know the Tube probably would've been quicker. Seems stupid to _drive _from Downing to Baker. Probably could've walked it quicker, honestly."

Mycroft merely scoffed, momentarily distracted from his agitation. "You are not seriously suggesting I take the London Underground." He seemed to think no explanation was necessary as to why this was such an absurd proposition.

"Who are we meeting at 221B?"

There was a pregnant pause wherein Mycroft seemed to think hard about whether to offer a reply. At length, he muttered; "My brother."

* * *

_November 25th, ten minutes later _

Firstly, Persephone had been struck at her own abominable stupidity - how had she not realised that her boss, named Holmes, was related so closely to the famous detective?

But Sherlock Holmes was nothing like Mycroft in looks, excepting that they were both rather taller than average.

Sherlock Holmes was not like the blogs had led her to believe. He was, in her opinion, rather more _childish _than she had thought he would be. He had not consented to answer the door, sending instead his Landlady - a Mrs Hudson - to welcome them up into the old, dusty flat.

Mrs Hudson had bright eyes, coiffed ginger hair and a high, clear voice which - it quickly transpired - she had no quarrel using.

She filled the stilted silence between brothers with a thousand peppering questions - how had Mycroft been? Why had it been so long since he last called? Who was Persephone, anyway? Was she enjoying her new role? Was her sister as well settled in America as Mrs Hudson had once been, when she had been married to a drug lord in Florida? Would they like a cup of tea? No? Were they quite sure? What about some biscuits?

All the while Sherlock lay with his bare feet dangling off the edge of a moth-bitten sofa, wearing only his pyjama bottoms and an ill-fitting Christmas sweater. He had not even opened his eyes to acknowledge their presence.

"Brother dear, kindly _put your feet down_."

Sherlock Holmes' eyes snapped open, surprisingly brilliant blue spheres which roved over Mycroft and then Persephone with lazerlike acuity.

It was in this moment that Persephone was struck with the strong family resemblance between the brothers. Much like it was with Mycroft, being stared down by Sherlock Holmes was like being roughly disassembled and then shoved hastily back together. They were both the same - children taking things apart to figure out how they worked and what made them tick.

"It's my flat, Mycroft, I'll put my feet wherever." Sherlock spoke in a low resonant tone, lazily flicking his dark curls out of his eyes and curling his toes in what had to be a gesture of open defiance. He showed every sign of wanting to rove about the room, fingers twitching as if to move and eyes darting about. The principle of keeping his feet up, however, seemed to take precedent over his personal wishes. It was plain to see - refusing to give in to Mycroft was more important than the small matter of personal liberty.

_What a queer little family they make! _

Mycroft exchanged irritable back-and-forth with his brother, though Persephone struggled to follow the particulars. Something about cicadas and a Pekingese - "It was all a bit _obvious_, don't you think, brother mine?", "Transparent. Of course the groomer did it. It's always the groomer. Though I admit that I wasn't expecting it to _actually _have six legs."

Persephone could only stand silently a few feet from Mycroft, eyes darting hopelessly between the brothers as she tried to decipher whatever mad code they were conversing in.

Mrs Hudson, similarly befuddled by the heated verbal sparring of Holmes and Holmes, offered Persephone a cup of tea yet again. Finding no good reason to decline beyond her own employer's stout refusal, she smiled and thanked Mrs Hudson for her hospitality.

"I'll just nip down and get the tray, then. Only I'm out of milk downstairs - would you mind checking the kitchen, dear?"

Persephone nodded and smiled obligingly at the cheerful landlady, and moved towards the dingy little kitchen.

Most of the room was taken up by a wooden bench which had something approximating a children's chemistry kit set up on it. The surface was littered with bits of metal and dirt and there were several insects which had been inexpertly skewered in place with dressing pins. She supposed it must be for some mad case, if the blog was anything to go by, but from an outsider's perspective it looked like the workshop of a total psychopath.

Persephone opened the refrigerator and uttered a soft scream.

She leapt back, knocking a stack of unwashed plates onto the ground where they shattered in a mess of sharp edges and food scraps, tearing a seam in her stockings as a jagged piece of crockery nicked her shin.

"For goodness _sake_, Jones, what's the matter now?" Mycroft poked his head out from around the corner, huffing as he saw the mess she had made.

She pointed dumbly at the still-open fridge. "There's a bag of eyeballs in there."

He eyed her in utter bemusement. "Yes."

"And that's… okay, that's normal. Judging from your total lack of a reaction." Persephone was beginning to feel foolish, which was stupid, considering that screaming was a _perfectly reasonable _thing to do when confronted by unexpected eyeballs.

"Brilliant deduction, Jones. Now get out of the kitchen."

Her lip twitched, and, unable to help herself, she replied; "You're right. I can't handle the heat."

"I beg you not to joke, Jones. It only upsets everybody."

Plucking a half-empty carton of milk from the fridge, Persephone returned to the living room. Sherlock was sitting upright now, hands clasped under his chin as he contemplated her with narrowed eyes.

Eyes never leaving her, he addressed Mycroft in a sardonic drawl; "So, when exactly did the highest office of the British Government implement a hiring policy based on cup size? _After _Brexit, I imagine."

Persephone blushed angrily and had to consciously stop herself from crossing her arms over her chest.

"She was recommended." Mycroft said stiffly.

"Good lord, Mycroft." Sherlock uttered quietly, partially narrowed blue eyes turning to Mycroft. "You've gotten yourself a goldfish."

Persephone had no notion of what this meant, but considering the way that Mycroft paled and pressed his lips thin, it couldn't have been good.

"_I have not_." He snarled in barely-suppressed fury. "Jones, wait in the car. And for god's sake don't _touch_ anything. I'll be down in a moment."

His eyes glinted menacingly at Sherlock. Persephone knew better than to argue, though she desperately wanted to stay and hear more brotherly bickering.

She encountered Mrs Hudson in the stairwell on her way down, and took her tea in the landing, opting not to use the milk carton which had been ever so close to the eyeballs. Quickly draining the dregs of a black Yorkshire tea - not her favourite by a long shot - Persephone obliged her employer and returned to the car idling outside.

When Mycroft eventually join her, Persephone knew better than to ask a single question about what had transpired between the brothers. Mycroft sat in icy silence, jaw working as he ruminated darkly on the unpleasant exchange he had no doubt just shared with Sherlock.

Persephone merely busied herself clearing her inbox via her phone, determinedly _not _looking in Mycroft's direction.

She had questions, of course, but they would have to wait.

* * *

_December 8th_

Mycroft glared down at his phone as though it had caused him mortal offence. There, blinking innocently, was an unread message from Persephone Jones.

This in and of itself was not peculiar. There were a thousand legitimate reasons that Jones might message him. What had been peculiar was Mycroft's reaction.

He had been taking an important call on the landline in his home office when the familiar chime of a text alert sounded.

He'd seen her name flashing, and before he knew it he was hurriedly cutting off the Prime Minister before snatching up his mobile.

He opened the message.

_What did it mean when Sherlock called me a goldfish? PJ. _

He stared blankly for a second, before rubbing his eyes tiredly. He should have foreseen this. It had been weeks since the incident at Baker Street, but Miss Jones was not the type to let go of things easily.

He typed a quick response; _None of your business. MH. _

_It is literally directly about me. How is it not my business? PJ. _

He huffed. _Do not trouble yourself. MH._

_Haven't you learned anything in the last two months, sir? I'm nothing if not trouble. PJ. _

He chuckled in spite of himself before falling into an unsettled silence, processing the wave of unfamiliar emotion that had seized him in that moment.

He had to face facts.

He was… _fond_.

He locked his phone and shoved it away from him in frustration. How on earth could this be happening to him? _Him_?

_She's just your assistant. She's just a pretty face. You see countless pretty faces every day and they never make you lose your nerve. She's nothing to you. _

His phone chimed and quick as lightning Mycroft had unlocked it and opened the message. He cursed his own weakness.

_Alright, you win. Sweet dreams, sir. _

_Sincerely, your favourite goldfish. _

_PJ _

He was typing a response before his higher mind had a chance to intercede. It felt as though he was always trying to outrun his own good sense where this infernal girl was concerned. Nethertheless, he allowed the slightest flutter of his heart to go unchallenged as he formed his reply.

_Sweet dreams, Miss Jones. _

"Damn." He groaned to himself, casting his treacherous phone aside and wearily rubbing his temples. "Damn, damn."

He was going to have to fire Jones.

* * *

**A/N**: Bless you all for your patience. Hope this chapter isn't too badly disjointed. Comments always much appreciated!


	5. Goodbye, Miss Jones

_November 9th_

"I think you're making a mistake, Sir."

Anthea's mouth was set and grim, her displeasure writ into every line of her face. But Mycroft was resolute, he would not be gainsaid into allowing Jones to stay by a pregnant woman.

"She is not suitable."

"She's actually pretty efficient, at least twice as good as I had thought she'd be."

"She lacks the appropriate disposition—"

"But the rest of the staff all love her!" Anthea burst, waving her arms about in a most un-Anthea-like way. "I wouldn't be surprised if Mike from public relations didn't cry to hear she'd been fired, for God's sake."

_Mike from public relations had taken a shine, eh? Had he flirted with her? Had she flirted back?_

That wouldn't do. He would remember this at Mike's next performance review.

_She's not yours_. He reminded himself for the umpteenth time.

"It's just not working out—"

Anthea huffed and cut across him.

"Mycroft, what happened?" She demanded.

In all of the years that they had worked together, Anthea had called Mycroft by his given name exactly two times. And both of those occasions had been serious national emergencies.

Firing Jones did not constitute a serious national emergency, last he checked.

He frowned at his long-term employee's sheer nerve.

"Nothing has happened. I simply do not wish to have her here any longer."

Anthea eyed him shrewdly. Rather than leaving his office, as he had dearly hoped she would, Anthea slowly made her way towards the armchair faced opposite him and sat down.

She simply looked at him, pensive. Perhaps she was waiting for him to break.

He would _not_.

"Sir." He noted her renewed use of the appropriate pleasantries and the gentle tone. "Help me to understand."

"She is…" Mycroft sighed and rubbed his face tiredly. He supposed there was no avoiding the sharing of some context behind his decision. "She is distracting."

Anthea quirked a perfectly-plucked brow, incredulity exuding from every pore of her usually just-bearably smug face. "Distracting?"

"Yes. Distracting. I cannot work like this."

"Like what ?"

Mycroft shook his head, unwilling to say. In all honesty, he wasn't even sure how to say it. What words were there for Miss Jones? The usual rules did not seem to apply to her. "I will do it this afternoon, if you would handle the particulars."

"Did she do something?"

"No." He paused, and then revised. "Not really."

Anthea fixed him with a beady, suspicious eye. "Not really?"

"It is becoming… an unprofessional relationship."

Anthea was too discerning for her own good - lips pursed, she asked; "On whose part, exactly?"

He sighed heavily — that was the crux of it all, wasn't it? This was all him , not Jones. If he had kept control of his damned emotions, if he had not encouraged her, the girl would have continued in gainful employment. She did not deserve this.

But it could not be helped.

"Mine, Hughes. Mine."

* * *

As firings went, it was ugly.

"_What?_" Jones had all but shrieked, causing Mycroft to flinch a little. Her fingernails dug little crescents into the faux-leather upholstery of the office chair she was sitting on — he had elected to do this in one of the conference rooms — far from the plush familiarity of his own office. "What do you mean '_my services are no longer required_'?"

Determinedly, he avoided meeting her eye.

"You will be paid a generous severance, of course. Three months. And Hughes has consented to be a reference for any future job applications — your performance has been satisfactory overall. But I must ask you to clear your desk immediately."

"Mycroft—"

"Hughes will show you out." He cut across her, still not looking. He nodded at Anthea, who stood in mutinous silence in the corner of the room.

Jones was crying now, but it was not the pitiful display Mycroft might have expected. These were furious tears — tears of rage. She looked at Mycroft with such an expression of wrath that for an infinitesimally small, irrational moment, he thought she might breathe fire at him.

It did not make his heart flutter in anything close to resembling awe. It didn't.

"You—" Her own rage seemed to render her unable to speak for a moment. Unable to look away, as though it were a horrendous train collision or an exploding building, he observed as she drew a shaking, tremulous breath before carrying on. "You are the worst— the _meanest_— how _could_ you? I thought we—"

"You agreed to a three month probation period, if you recall." He said with false calm — his face was the smooth, undisturbed surface of a lake. No, that wasn't quite right. It was a frozen pond, ungiving and unyielding and hard and cold and inhospitable — this was _him_. This was who he really was. He ignored the heart that was hammering in his chest at the thought that she hated him, because of _course_ she did.

It had been an inevitability, from the very moment he had set eyes on her.

Isn't that what Moriarty and Adler had called him — the Iceman?

Upon first comprehending the limits of his disposition he had resolved himself. If he could not change his nature, he would at the very least use it to his advantage. He would be a void — he would be absolute logic, total cunning, and yes, unfeeling. It would be his armor and his weapon both.

"I think it best if you left before you make even more of a scene." He observed in perfect tranquility as his frost-bitten words found their mark.

Jones glared at him with pearlescent, tear-filled eyes, jaw clenched, fingernails digging into palms. It was as though she were vibrating out of her skin in her fury, held in check by the barest thread of self-control.

How was it that she could be so glorious to him in such a state?

In the end, it was the gentle press of Anthea's hand on her shoulder which prompted Jones to move. With the sort of pride and contemptuousness he might have expected of a countess, she rose from her chair and glowered down at him.

Haughtily, and with a voice still thick with tears, she spoke her final words; "I would say it has been a pleasure, Mr Holmes, but my integrity forbids it."

He made no answer as she swept towards the exit — he merely told himself over and over that it didn't hurt.

The verbal lashings of an ex-employee were nothing to him. _Nothing nothing nothing._

Grasping the handle, she stilled. Not looking back, she muttered; "Goodbye."

She slammed the door with such tremendous force that a picture on the other side of the room — first hung in 1788 — fell and shattered.

He spoke into empty space; "Goodbye, Miss Jones."

* * *

Persephone would not have thought Anthea Hughes' response to her being fired would be a muttered; "Come on, we're going for drinks."

And yet — there it was. Anthea had dragged her out of the building, scooping up jacket and bag en route, half-jogging through the London crowds and up a narrow staircase which gave way to an up-market cocktail bar.

Hughes had shoved her onto a barstool and called out for a glass of white. Shoving it in front of her, she settled into the adjacent stool. Persephone couldn't help but feel a bit confronted by the dark, penetrating eyes trained on her, not to mention the conspicuously protuberant pregnant belly below them.

"Should you even be here?" She gestured at Anthea's distended stomach. She was only halfway through her pregnancy but she looked bloody massive. Persephone had thus far resisted the impulse to ask if Anthea was expecting twins.

"If I watch people drink for long enough I almost start to feel tipsy," Anthea said by way of explanation, taking a disappointed sip from a glass tumbler of water, ice, and lemon. "So, drink up, will you?"

"Well…" Persephone frowned and felt the urge to shield her wineglass from view. "That's bloody strange."

"You'll be singing a different tune when it's your turn." Anthea eyed the wine with ill-concealed longing. "But we're not here to talk about pregnancy and how awful it is."

Persephone raised her eyebrows. "Is that not the point of a friendly pint? To drink and talk about our lives? Our interests? And yes, our pregnancies, where applicable."

"Don't be daft." Anthea shot her a look. "We're here to talk about Mycroft, and if I get to watch you drink, then that's all the better. So d rink ."

Partially because she was so intimidated, Persephone obliged and took a generous gulp of her wine.

She had just been fired, for the second time this year, after all. She felt a lump form in her throat as she ran over it in her head. How had this happened?

"I just don't understand what I did—"

"Look, I'm going to say some things and you're going to shut up and hear them, alright?" Anthea didn't pause to hear a response before forging ahead. "Mycroft didn't fire you because he thinks you're incompetent."

"Then why—"

"_He fired you_," Anthea sent her a glare which she took to mean 'shut up', "because he finds you distracting, apparently."

Persephone opened her mouth and then closed it again. Eventually, she managed a word of several syllables. "Distracting."

"Yes."

"That—"

"Makes a load of sense, I know."

"_What?_"

She had just been about to say the exact opposite.

Anthea tapped the counter of the bar with a single manicured nail. "Do you know the last time Mycroft had a relationship?"

Persephone hazarded a guess. "Uh, never?"

Anthea nodded. "Exactly. Never."

Persephone frowned. "You're going to have to explain yourself a bit better if you expect me to follow."

Anthea sighed, and in a painstaking voice redolent of an overtired preschool teacher, explained; "He's never had a relationship, never wanted one, and then you—"

Persephone's eyes widened, comprehension dawning. "No!"

_It couldn't be._

Anthea nodded. "I think you frighten him."

_Frighten_ him? "You can't be serious!"

He'd been so cold— so _cruel_—

_ Insubordination. MH._

_ Sweet dreams, Miss Jones._

The texts flashed to mind unbidden, causing a lump to form in her throat. There had been flirting, she knew there had been. But feelings— On his part? It was mind-boggling. She could barely come to grips with her own, let alone _his_.

She had formed a crush on that impossible man, she knew it. How could she not, when he was so clever and brilliant and darkly funny? But she had shoved those feelings aside for the most part, because somewhere in the deep recesses of her unfathomably stupid brain she did understand that he would be problematic for her. He was so often derisive and unfeeling — half the time he acted as though he actively disliked her, for goodness sake. How on earth would a relationship even work with him?

He had been nursing tender feelings towards her, and his first thought had been to piff her into unemployment as though she were no more than an old dishrag or an empty juice-box.

It made no sense. It was such a stupid situation. He was stupid — firing her for a reason like that! What a jerk! What a cad!

As if reading her mind, Anthea placed a gentle hand over hers and said; "Just try and remember that even Mycroft Holmes makes mistakes. Try and forgive him when he eventually comes around."

She huffed, trying to ignore the tremulous beating of her traitor heart at the thought that he actually _liked_ her.

"No promises."

* * *

**A/N**: Just a quick one, but the rest of this story (four chapters to go) is storyboarded and partially written!


	6. Government Robot Missy

_November 10th _

In the end, it was Missy that Mycroft had to thank — or at the very least blame — for how things ultimately turned out.

"She's an idiot." Mycroft groused, glowering across the office at Jones' replacement.

"She's got the experience, glowing references, and you find her repulsive." Anthea replied dryly, arms crossed. She had made no secret of the fact that she disapproved of the whole firing business. "Didn't you say you wanted somebody _'totally unlike Jones' _?"

"I didn't mean incompetent."

"Missy is very competent." Anthea said fairly. "She's on top of everything, hasn't overlooked a single detail."

It was perfectly true. Missy had been getting through the work at least three times as quickly as Jones had ever managed to. She was like a hyper-efficient government robot — exactly what Mycroft had first envisioned wanting when the role first became available.

Government Robot Missy, unlike Jones, always got his coffee order perfectly correct.

Mycroft was silent for a moment, before finally saying; "She's boring."

"Is she meant to entertain you?" Anthea asked with raised eyebrows.

"Jones used to—" He coughed. "Never mind."

"Mmmhm." Mycroft didn't bother to call Anthea out on her eye-roll, and instead listened to the click of her heels as she swept away.

Because what was he to say?

That Jones used to get his coffee order wrong on purpose, and that when Mycroft had finally given in and resorted to doing the chore himself, he also fetched Jones her customary flat white with two sugars? That Jones always kept her hair out and when the flyaway strands fell in her eyes she would blow them aside in a puff of air out of the corner of her mouth, and he found that rather endearing? That Jones tended to rest her chin on her hand when she was bored and that she sometimes dozed off for brief periods in the late afternoon, making her all glowing-soft and blinky?

It wasn't important that everybody else in the office liked her or that she kept up with the work well enough (though not to Government Robot Missy standards). It wasn't important that _Mycroft _liked her. It wasn't.

He reminded himself that it was unprofessional to sabotage a coffee order. It was unprofessional to let hair flow wild and unkempt in an office environment. It was unprofessional to _fall asleep at work _.

It wasn't endearing, it wasn't sweet, and he _didn't _miss it.

Across the room, he heard Government Robot Missy droning on about the latest batch of communications from the Prime Minister. Her voice had a sonorous quality which he thought could do with being medically researched and put to use in the fight against clinical insomnia.

As he watched, Government Robot Missy straightened the line of her blazer, flicking off imaginary dust and then straightening a pencil so that it was perfectly flush with the desk edge.

And when 10am came, Government Robot Missy was there at his office door, coffee order in hand.

Mycroft looked down at the steaming hot, double-strength macchiato — it was exactly what he had asked for.

He sighed a heavy sigh.

He missed Jones. 

* * *

_November 19th _

It took exactly nine days for Government Robot Missy to break Mycroft Holmes.

She had been so unfalteringly professional, so robotic, so flawless in her execution of every task, that it had taken Mycroft every modicum of self-control not to throw her through a window.

It wasn't fair, he knew. But nothing could pardon Missy of the deplorable crime of _not being Jones _.

Anthea's expression had been unbearably smug when he had sheepishly mentioned that he'd prefer to do without Government Robot Missy.

"You're hiring Persephone back, of course." She grinned, insufferably triumphant.

He shot her an exasperated look, but confirmed;

"I am hiring Jones back."

She chuckled, and then slyly remarked; "I'd be ready to beg, Sir. She was _not _happy to be let go."

"If she was so unhappy to be let go, I would think her exceedingly pleased to be asked back."

"If you say so, Sir."

Privately, Mycroft fretted. What if she did say no? She had been so furious, after all. Incandescently, gloriously furious. He doubted Government Robot Missy had ever flown into a rage in her life — the bore.

It worried Mycroft that his romantic preferences, so recently discovered, tended towards infantile displays of rage, and insidious acts of defiance, and glib comments, and warm, lazy smiles.

Had he _really _lived these forty-seven years in perfect solitude only to form an attachment to a directionless sociology graduate with poor manners and too many expressions?

_Yes _, he immediately answered himself. That was exactly what was happening to him.

He pulled Jones' address from her file (29/1 Linton Row), and felt a small thrill at the thought of seeing her in person (it was what the situation called for, and not an excuse to set his eyes upon her, he told himself). He wondered vaguely if he should pick up flowers on the way, but quickly dismissed the idea as ludicrous.

He admonished himself. _You're not asking her to be your girlfriend, you're asking her to be your employee. _

He would learn to tell the difference.

* * *

_November 19th, evening _

The door of 29/1 Linton Row swung open to reveal Persephone in pale blue, long-sleeve pyjamas, her mobile phone pressed between her cheek and her shoulder.

She did the slightest double take at the sight of Mycroft before grudging holding the door open and allowing him entry.

"Listen, Guthrie — I'm gonna have to call you back. Yes— Yes, I promise."

Mycroft walked past her into the flat — which was almost impossibly worse than he had imagined it would be — and waited for Persephone to hang up.

She clicked the lock button on her phone and chucked it in the general direction of the couch, with little regard for its safety. She really was very careless with her possessions.

She rounded on him, eyes flashing dangerously as she gestured for him to take a seat, and he settled into what transpired was the most uncomfortable couch in existence.

Jones swung herself up onto the kitchen counter, legs dangling. She looked extremely cross.

"What are _you _doing here?"

He paused, in truth he was not entirely sure what to say.

Eventually he went with; "First, I want you to know that your work performance has hardly been flawless."

It was perhaps not the best way to start things.

Persephone drew herself to full height, and Mycroft noted with a thrill that she wore that same haughty look of indignation which he first glimpsed upon firing her. He was swiftly becoming accustomed to the expression — he wondered if anybody had been treated to it as often as he seemed to be.

"I've had no complaints!"

He scoffed. "You certainly have. For one — you nap in the afternoons."

"Only when I've been up all night with _you _, dealing with the latest disaster."

"Your hair is a mess."

"It's perfectly straight and clean, thank you. I just prefer it out. And that isn't against the dress code, I checked."

"You deliberately sabotage my coffee order."

At this, her lips twisted into a smirk. "Yeah, alright. You got me."

He couldn't help the exasperated chuckle that escaped him. "You are horribly unprofessional."

"So are you." She shot back. "The way you fired me—"

He conceded with a nod, raising a hand. "I am proposing a truce."

She frowned. "A truce."

"We just forget about the whole awful business and you come back to work, so that I can fire Government Robot Missy."

" _'Government Robot Missy…' _"

"She's horrendously dull, Jones. I beg you not to leave me with her."

"It's no less than you deserve." She said, somewhat peevishly. "I suppose you want me to stop the sleeping and the coffee tampering and the me wearing my hair the way I like it?"

"No." He said shortly.

She blinked. "No?"

"Everything was fine exactly the way it was. I'll get the coffees, seeing as it's _clearly _beyond you. The hair is fine—" privately Mycroft thought it looked rather pretty, but he wasn't about to _say _that, "—and I will try and be conscious that you take time in lieu when circumstances demand longer hours. You are entitled to rest. At times I forget, as it is not my habit to take time out."

She regarded him warily. "You're hiring me back so that you can replace a hyper-efficient corporate robot who is _better_ than me, and you don't even care if I improve."

"I would go so far as to specifically request that you do _not _improve, if improving at all alters your character."

"Oh?"

"I have concluded that...how would you put it? 'If it isn't broken, don't fix it?'"

" _'If it ain't broke…' _" she corrected with a mutter.

"That is not grammatically correct."

She rolled her eyes and huffed. For a moment, she regarded him with quiet, pensive eyes.

"You just—" she broke off, and when she spoke again her voice was small, "you just threw me away."

"It was an unforgivable lapse in judgement." He said, allowing as much sincerity into his tone as he dared. "I never meant to hurt you, Jones."

She was quiet for a long time. Mycroft contented himself to wait.

At length, she spoke; "I want a nine-day fortnight."

"Fine."

"And a better computer. Mine's second-hand and it's getting slow."

"We will get you a new computer. I will even permit you to pick it."

"What if I want one of those pretty rose gold MacBooks?"

"Then we will order one of those pretty rose gold MacBooks."

"That isn't standard-issue."

"Nor are you." He replied, not quite able to help himself. In fairness, he felt flattery could only help his cause at this crucial juncture.

She surveyed him with wary eyes, thinking hard.

"Fine, I'll come back."

Mycroft let out the breath he didn't realise he was holding. "Thank you, Jones. I'm really not getting on with Missy. She likes dinner theatre and lines up her pencils like lead-filled soldiers."

Persephone grinned. "You sound more than a little frightened of her."

"There are days when I fear for us all."

Persephone paused, her fleece-pyjama clad legs dangling over the kitchen counter.

"Dinner?" She finally asked. "You dared step foot in my apartment complex — surprised my neighbours didn't steal your shoes, by the way — so you might as well get a feed out of it."

It would be a nice gesture to accept, he knew. A sign of the newly re-established peace between them.

"Yes. Fine." Mycroft sighed, shifting uncomfortably on her lumpy couch for a few moments before giving up on the dream of lumbar support. "This needs reupholstering. Or setting on fire. I cannot decide which."

"Probably the latter." Persephone said lightly, appearing quite unaffected by the swipe. She had swung herself down from the kitchen counter and was busy pulling pots and pans from battered cupboards. "I got it secondhand out of university. Never thought to replace it. I sit on the floor, mostly."

"Perhaps you wouldn't sit on the floor so much if you didn't have such an awful couch."

She merely shrugged. "Do you like pasta?"

"I like it fine."

"Well good, because that's all I have ingredients for."

As Persephone started pulling produce from the refrigerator, Mycroft let his mind wander to the snippet of conversation he had overheard through the door.

"Why were you speaking with that specimen of human pond scum, earlier?"

"Don't you already know, like, all of these things because of my shoelaces or something?" Persephone asked distractedly, bringing a pot to boil before rummaging in her cupboards again.

"That is not how deductions work."

"So you don't have _any _clue why I might be speaking to Guthrie?"

"I know the essential reason, it's always the same with your kind." He paused for effect. " _Sentiment _."

She smiled wryly. "Well, isn't that enough of an answer for you?"

"If it was, I would not have bothered asking the question. I am not a psychic, Jones."

She paused, clearly weighing her next words carefully. "He said he was sorry for what he did."

"Well, that makes everything better."

"He said that Lydia is his soulmate but that I'm his best friend, and that our not talking is killing him. He says it feels like he's being split down the centre and he can't imagine his life without me in it."

"Very dramatic."

"He wants to be mates."

At this Mycroft actually laughed. "...Oh, you poor creatures, you're so endearingly blind."

She seemed to choose to ignore the majority of this statement and determinedly focused on the positives. "You find us endearing? That's progress."

"Please, I don't _actually _."

"Because heaven forbid ordinary people delight you in any way."

"Quite." Mycroft nodded. "Though I will admit to enjoying _you _as one might enjoy a circus chimp, on occasion."

Persephone raised an eyebrow at him. "I'm a circus chimp to you?"

"Congratulations on the upgrade."

She laughed. "Lord, what was I before?"

"On par with the rest of humanity — so pick your favourite invertebrate, basically."

She shook her head, smiling ruefully. "Normal people don't _have _favourite invertebrates, you know."

He surveyed her knowingly. "Normal people don't. _You _do."

She chuckled. "Fine. Octopus. Hands down."

He shook his hair despairingly. "Of course."

"Octopi are so clever! And they have such a convenient number of legs!" Persephone said enthusiastically (which he did _not _find adorable) as she sprinkled some salt into the water. "It's better than a circus chimp, anyway."

"It certainly isn't. Chimps are of near-human intelligence." Mycroft said, head turned to watch her progress in the kitchen. "You can hardly expect me to pay you many compliments when your only response when I do is to sulk and complain."

She turned towards him at this, expression incredulous. "You think you're _complimenting _me?"

"I am giving you the highest compliment of which I am capable." Mycroft said patiently. "Consider that I frequently compare my own brother to a sort of dog, and _his _intellect far surpasses your own in every possible way."

"Oh, well, when you put it like _that… _" She scoffed and returned to cooking. "Do you know how people usually compliment each other?"

"Certainly. With all manner of dishonest drivel."

He gave up on the couch entirely and stood on the other side of the kitchen counter, watching as she went about her work.

"No," Persephone turned to face him fully, setting down the wooden spoon. "People say things that they mean which _aren't _backhanded or undermining. Nice things."

" _Fascinating _."

"Like…" Persephone stepped forward and leaned across the counter towards him, suddenly uncomfortably close. "I want you to know that I really appreciate the things you do for me. Warning me off Guthrie. Getting my coffee even though _I'm _supposed to be the one who does that for you. Asking me to text you that I'm home safe. You can't fool me, Mycroft Holmes — you're a nice man."

She was smiling at him, her eyes crinkling at the corners. He could count her eyelashes at this distance.

He coughed and stepped back from the counter, averting his eyes. "Right— Well. Do you, erm.. cook often?"

There was a pause before she answered, and Mycroft couldn't help but despise the knowing way that she looked at him. "Almost never."

"I suppose I must acknowledge the rare privilege, then."

"As well you should. I am an excellent occasional cook. I can create four dishes perfectly, not counting toast and microwavable mac'n'cheese."

"Remarkable." He said dryly.

"I suppose _you've _perfectly memorised seven hundred and twenty-three complicated recipes and can replicate them all without effort." She quipped in return.

Mycroft snorted. "Why would I ever bother to learn that? That's what staff are for."

"You can identify every single species of rose based on sight but you think learning to cook is beneath you?"

"Yes." Mycroft paused. "And I only know every species of rose registered before December of last year. No doubt countless more have been bred since. I'm slipping."

"Oh yes. First it's forgetting the name of a recently-bred rose, and before you know it you've forgotten where your car is parked and your favourite nephew's name."

"Precisely why I have a driver, and no nephews."

She grinned at the joke, and Mycroft allowed himself to feel a little pleased. "How _did _Sherlock take it when you banned him from ever procreating?"

"Do be sensible, Jones. I didn't ban him from procreating altogether, only from siring males."

"Not a problem, given that he definitely has perfect control over such things."

"Well, gender _is _determined by the male."

"God, you're not going to lecture me about sperm again, are you?" She groaned.

Companionable chatter was traded back and forth as Persephone cooked, and Mycroft learned a great deal about his newly-rehired staff member. She was very fond of orcas for some reason, and spoke about their hunting prowess with a bafflingly disproportionate amount of enthusiasm. She liked all sorts of music — though most of it was a bit too out there for Mycroft's tastes. She had tattoos, which Mycroft had suspected, but was pleased to gain confirmation that his initial guess of a small rib tattoo and a back piece had been correct. She told him all about her study with the NHS and her funding being cut off, and how that professional blow had come no less than a fortnight after her breakup with the worthless pediatrician. She told him about her sister in Washington and her strained relationship with her parents, who lived in France now.

Mycroft told her very little of himself, save for the fact that he was fond of classic cinema and had briefly holidayed in Prague when last he was forced to take annual leave.

When their meal was finally ready, Mycroft found himself looking around the cramped flat in confusion.

"There is no dining table."

Persephone shrugged. "Yeah. No space. I usually just hang around the counter, or eat on the couch."

He eyed the lumpy monstrosity that Persephone had optimistically called a couch. "I'll stand."

She nodded, pushing his bowl and a single fork across the kitchen island and setting her own down opposite. She leaned forward on the counter and started to eat.

Persephone hummed appreciatively and set her fork down. "I'm calling it — this is a nine out of ten."

Mycroft took a tentative bite and scoffed.

"Jones, this is a four at best."

She gasped in mock-affront.

"That's a fine way to repay my hospitality!"

"If the ten-point scale assumes that the worst pasta ever cooked sits at the value one, and the very best pasta dish ever sits at the value ten, then—"

"Please do not logic my cooking skills."

"A four is a very fair, very respectable score." He reasoned.

She huffed, then chuckled, shaking her head. "Well, thanks then."

They ate in relative peace, sparring gently as they ate. Mycroft made Persephone laugh four times, and she repaid the favour twice.

It was only as they were sharing the single rhubarb and ginger ice lolly that Persephone had scrounged from the back corner of her freezer that Mycroft was struck with the unwelcome thought — this was the happiest he'd been in years. Sitting in some urban slum sharing a frozen confection with his subordinate.

The realisation caused some colour to show on his cheeks — he could have guessed that Persephone would notice immediately.

She grinned. "Something on your mind?"

"Many things. Always." He replied humourlessly.

For a moment he stared at his half of the ice lolly, which had been roughly hewn to pieces and split between two bowls. His eyes ghosted over the frost-edged treat, which had been kept too cold in the back corner of Persephone's cheap freezer and had crystalised a little.

Falteringly, he said; "Do you know that my codename for special operations is _'Antarctica' _?"

Persephone tilted her head to the side quizzically. "I didn't."

He cast a sideways glance at her, and asked one of the many questions that had been playing on his mind; "Do you think it suits me?"

Persephone's eyes widened in surprise. "Oh. Well…"

"I have been said to be rather cold."

"Well, yeah, sure… but…" Persephone faltered, and Mycroft felt sure it was because she couldn't find the right words for a convincing lie. "That's not all of you."

He chuckled without amusement. "Isn't it?"

"No." Persephone said, her voice more firm now. "There's other stuff. Nice stuff."

"You're very sweet, Jones. But I fear that the moniker is accurate." Mycroft descended into troubled silence for a moment. "I suppose I never realised exactly how fitting it was."

A funny expression crossed Persephone's face, and Mycroft almost startled when she placed a hand on his arm.

"You're forgetting something about ice, though."

He dared to meet her gaze — her eyes were warm brown and gentle and _staring _at him.

Hesitantly, he asked; "And what, pray tell, is that?"

She smiled softly. "It melts."

**A/N**:

The thing I love about these two is that whenever I write them they just WON'T. STOP. TALKING. So have this dialogue-heavy update.

I just couldn't leave things with Jones fired and Mycroft self-sabotaging!

I love reading the comments on this story so much, it's really pushed me to get my act together and figure out where exactly this story is going.


	7. I Want That

**Warning: **There's some sexual content in this chapter. For those who want to skip it, it starts at "Now, how shall I punish you?" and continues until the end of the chapter. It's nothing insane but it has some BDSM undertones/hair-pulling so if you'd rather not then just read till then and tune in next time for some more wholesome content!

* * *

Persephone was pacing.

Such was her habit when her head was impossibly full of thoughts — and today she was fit to burst for all of the obsessing she'd been doing. She had gone over it in her head a thousand times, analysed each interaction from every possible vantage point. She was certain.

Mycroft Holmes _liked _her.

She liked him back, of _course_ she did. She had never known anyone quite like him, so dry and sharp and breathtakingly brilliant. With Mycroft there was verbal combat and play-fighting and subtle acts of care which were almost always immediately undercut with a biteless swipe or insult.

Nobody had ever challenged her like this before, nor had she ever felt so special to another person, for the simple fact that he didn't treat anybody else the way he treated her.

And then, _then_, there were those tiny glimpses of vulnerability. Something she never expected to see from him. The faraway sadness in every line of his face when he told her that his codename was Antarctica, the frankly _shocking_ way that he allowed her to comfort him. Her chest literally ached as she thought of it.

The question which remained was deceptively complex — what exactly should happen next?

Because Mycroft did not _seem_ like one for romancing. He didn't have girlfriends. Anthea had told her as much.

His fondness for her didn't necessitate that anything about their relationship ought to change. In fact, Mycroft may _prefer_ that everything remain the same — he was hardly known for a willingness to invite chaos and change into otherwise stable arrangements, after all. His whole life revolved around the task of steering Great Britain towards the smoothest course, averting catastrophe before it happened.

So what if he saw her as nothing more than another potential catastrophe to be averted?

Perhaps for Mycroft, their gentle sparring and bickering was enough. Maybe he simply wanted the opportunity to be near her, in a semi-professional-friendlike sense. Maybe he wasn't the sort of man who liked to kiss or touch at all.

She registered a dull pang of disappointment.

This was quickly chased by the lurching ebb-and-flow of overwhelming guilt. Should it really matter to her whether he wanted those things? Surely it ought to be enough that he cared for her; did she really need touch and sex in order to legitimise their… whatever they had?

_No_. Her mouth set in firm resolve. She would not be put out if it turned out he never wanted sex. She wouldn't walk away from him over that.

She'd just buy a vibrator like a fucking adult.

With this resolution came a certain sense of calm. She wanted to be there for him, to be with him, and she was willing to accept whatever level of relationship he was able to offer her.

But then there was Guthrie.

Who had asked to meet her for dinner on Friday. As friends. To catch up.

_There's nothing wrong with meeting up with an old boyfriend._ She told herself firmly. _You're not committed to Mycroft in any way, save for this strange psychological attachment that you've formed without his consent. It's all totally innocent anyway. You don't have to feel guilty just because your boss-slash-potential-future-asexual-boyfriend might'nt approve. You don't need his permission or his approval. You are a strong, independent—_

She sighed.

It was no use. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't twist meeting Guthrie into even the vague semblance of a good idea.

Because she had spent two years madly in love with him and even though he had hurt her badly, the aftershocks of that connection, that mad attraction they had shared, could still be felt whenever she was within ten feet of him. She knew it was dangerous to be around him, what with the shadowy tendrils of their broken love still curling around her heart and _squeezing, squeezing_ whenever he got close. He was so familiar to her, and falling into bed with him had never been a hardship.

He'd be charming, and beautiful, and she'd muck everything up with Mycroft just for another taste of that easy wrongness.

She pulled out her phone and began typing out a message.

_Hey Guthrie. Look, I'm really sorry, but something's come up on Friday, I won't be able to meet you for that drink. Some other time. PJ. _

She hit send and exhaled.

It felt like garbage, but it was the right thing to do.

She was proud of herself.

* * *

Persephone managed to keep her thoughts to herself for almost an entire week, which was something of a personal record.

When Friday evening rolled around, however, she found herself extending her stay in the office arbitrarily. First, she insisted that she wanted to completely clear her inbox "so that things would run more smoothly at the start of next week", which caused Mycroft to look at her with such abject shock that she briefly feared he was experiencing some sort of catastrophic cardiac event. Then she lingered by Anthea's desk and insisted on helping her with a few last-minute jobs before she left for prenatal yoga.

It was when Persephone actually resorted to cleaning her keyboard that Mycroft cracked.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" He asked, clearly so driven to distraction by her antics that he dropped his fountain pen (a heavy, expensive and _very_ historic Montblanc Meisterstück 149 worth more than the entire contents of her flat) with a loud clatter.

"There's nothing wrong with me!"

"If you have something to say—"

"No! Nothing!"

"Then go _home_, Jones."

Persephone froze for a moment, torn between staying and going. Awkwardly, she packed her bag and stood to leave, wavering between Mycroft's desk and the office exit. Shifting her weight from foot to foot in uncertainty, she wondered if it would be best to just come clean. Confess her feelings. Ask him to have a drink with her.

It didn't have to sound barmy.

When she opened her mouth, however, what came out was; "Are you asexual?"

It was blundering, and abrupt, and altogether the actual worst way she could have asked this potentially sensitive question.

She prayed that somewhere, somehow, a piano (or perhaps even an anvil) was being airlifted with the express purpose of being dropped on her head like _right the fuck now_.

Mycroft's eyes widened and he stilled, wrong-footed for once in his life. "Pardon?"

"Sorry— Never mind." She turned towards the door, horribly flustered. "It's not my business. Sorry. See you Monday."

"Jones. Stop."

Her body obeyed and she froze in door-frame, screwing her eyes shut as she cursed herself. She was such an idiot. Slowly, she turned to face him, not quite able to fully meet his eye.

"Mhmm?"

"I am not asexual." He said, sounding totally bemused. "Where on earth did you get that notion?"

"I don't know, just your…" she waved a hand at his general person, eyes trained on the spot slightly to the left of him, "Y'know. And Anthea said you've never really dated, so."

From her peripheral vision she saw him scoff. "Honestly, Hughes isn't half as observant as she thinks she is. I have been sleeping with Lady Smallwood for ten months."

_Oh. _

Her stomach dropped. Her insides had surely just been filled with cold lead.

"Right." Her throat was tight.

She turned to leave, guts ice and throat on fire and completely fucking _wounded_, but Mycroft only kept talking.

"Of course, I haven't seen her for a while—"

"Yeah, well, I'm going to dinner with Guthrie tonight, so." It was a blatant lie and an extremely childish thing to say, but at that moment Persephone couldn't care less. "I'd better get going. Night."

She watched with some measure of sadistic pleasure as Mycroft's expression darkened and he rose from his seat, striding to the doorway where she stood.

"_Dinner with Geoff_." Each vowel was saturated with derision. "A singularly stupid notion, Jones."

"Not your business, though, is it?"

He surveyed her closely, for a moment that seemed to stretch forever, before saying, in an infuriatingly tender tone; "I want you to understand — I haven't seen Alicia Smallwood in that capacity since a few weeks after you started working for me."

"See her as much or as little as you like, I don't care."

_I do care. I care so fucking much it hurts. _

"You can't fool me, Jones." He said. "You're a terrible liar."

Her voice was quavering and high; "_Shut up_."

"It's not the same as it is with Lady Smallwood." Mycroft said, tone gentle, as though she were an especially overtired, temperamental toddler and not a grown woman half-mad with misplaced jealousy over her _boss, fuck he was her boss what was she even doing— _"You are not like her. You are not like anyone else I've ever known, Jones."

"I really ought to be going—"

"Don't."

* * *

"Don't."

Of course Mycroft _knew_ that she was lying about dinner, Jones was nothing if not transparent. It was a retaliatory swipe intended to cause jealousy, which was, within itself, somewhat flattering.

But the thought of it one day being true, of her reaching out to that slime and falling back into his grasp and _leaving_… it was beyond the pale. Simply unacceptable.

He liked Jones exactly where she was.

_Maybe, _a small voice inside his head added, _maybe even a little closer would be good. _

So he played along.

"Don't go to dinner with Gunter." _Ever. _

Persephone remained hanging warily in the doorframe, regarding him with cautious eyes. "It's Guthrie."

"I don't _care_ what his name is," Mycroft said. "He isn't important."

She came closer, away from the doorframe and towards where he stood by the desk. He let himself move forward, too.

"Why do you care?" Her voice was barely a whisper. "Why do you care who I go out with?"

"I don't." He said, more out of habit than true conviction.

Of course they both already _knew_ the truth. He hadn't been working very hard to conceal it, after all. She'd surely known since his visit to her flat, if not before then.

And he was _tired_, so tired. Tired of arguing with himself about propriety. Tired of trying to push her away when she was so determined to be close to him.

She stood barely two feet away from him now. He could see a small sunspot on her nose that he'd never noticed before.

"You do." At this distance he could almost feel her breath as she spoke. Her lips were hovering so close to his own, _daring_ him to do it. "I know you care. I know you like me. But you're being so _stupid_ about it."

Her eyes flashed with fire and _want_ and he found that his own reply came out scarcely louder than a whisper against her lips;

"Insubordination."

And then he kissed her.

Her startled 'mmph!' quickly gave way to the slow slide of her lips against his. She let out the most delicious sigh, and before he knew what he was doing he had his hand tangled in her hair and was pulling her close against him.

When he ran his tongue over her lower lip, he noticed that she tasted like those rhubarb and ginger ice lollies from her flat.

_Of course she does._ He thought with a swell of fondness. _She is such a ridiculous creature. _

They broke apart. Her breath caught and her lips were parted as she gazed up at him with wild eyes, fingers interlocking behind his neck and holding him in place, as though she were afraid he'd pull away.

He let his hands trail down to rest at her waist.

"Now, how shall I punish you?" He murmured softly, with a flicker of amusement at the confused expression which crossed her face. "For your _backchat_."

He nipped at the smooth, pale skin under her jawline, and smirked as he heard her gasp.

"Maybe _I_ should punish _you_." She said breathily into his ear. "For taking so bloody long to do this."

He chuckled, he liked her courage and spark very much, though it was not in his nature to submit.

He pushed her down onto the desk, pinning her by the shoulders.

Personal effects rolled off the desk and onto the floor where they clattered noisily. He heard glass from a picture-frame containing an especially unflattering family photo that his mother had insisted upon gifting during her last visit smash. _Good_.

She looked up at him, wide-eyed, her whole body coiled in arousal.

"You will do no such thing." He said, looming over her with his hands resting on her hips. "Do not deceive yourself. I am still in charge here, Miss Jones."

He kissed her hard, and she kissed him back. He traced his thumb down her neck and along her collarbone. She shivered and he was satisfied to see that her pupils were blown. It was obvious to him how much she _wanted _him to have her.

In this regard, at least, they were on the same page.

_First time for everything. _He thought with a flicker of amusement.

His touch on her body was bruising, overmastering, and hers left retaliatory, red half-moon crescents in his skin. He liked the way it stung, he liked that he inspired enough passion in her to occasion these small harms.

Like everything else between them, physical affection was a skirmish — playful, teasing, _challenging_.

"_Mycroft_," she moaned softly, which pleased him to no end. "Please."

He tutted amusedly, lacing his fingers through hers and pinning her hands on either side of her head. She wriggled vainly, though Mycroft couldn't help but notice that she wasn't trying very hard.

"Those are some _lovely _manners," he said praisingly, relishing the sight of her underneath him. "But I'm afraid I am not clear on what you desire. Please, _what_? I would like you to be explicit, Miss Jones."

She looked at him with pink cheeks and wide eyes. His request — or rather his _command_ — seemed to have robbed her temporarily of speech.

"You're not going to be shy now, are you?" He allowed his thumb to caress the near-translucent skin of her wrists, tracing the patterns of the blue veins which wound and forked like tiny river systems. It occurred to him that Persephone Jones was a world unto herself, complex and interwoven and at this moment, completely and entirely _his_. "I've become rather accustomed to your cheek."

She stared up at him as though she couldn't quite believe what was happening. She looked so lovely like this, wide-eyed and pliant and _quiet for once_.

"Do you want me to touch you?" He asked softly. He could coax her through this if she needed it. He could undo her with little more than his voice if he so wished.

"Yes." She quickly said breathlessly, as if fearful the offer would be rescinded at any moment. "Yes, I want that."

His fingers ghosted down her stomach, brushing the waistband of her skirt.

"Would you like me to go higher, or lower?" He asked lightly, delighting in the way she trembled at his touch.

"_Fuck_." Pause. "L-Lower."

He let his touch trail underneath her skirt, coming to a halt _just before._

She let out a little huff of frustration and arched her hips — trying to get him to touch where she wanted, but that was _not_ how the game was played.

"Higher or lower?" He inquired, gaze fixed on her flushed, pretty face.

She breathed shakily, but when she spoke her voice was quite clear. "Lower."

"Lower, _what_?"

"Lower, please." She bit her lip and then hastily added; "Sir."

He suppressed a groan and felt himself twitch. Having her call him that in this context _did_ things to him.

"You're such a fast learner." He said, slipping two fingers inside of her. "You're so _good_."

She moaned and her hips came bucking up eagerly to welcome his touch.

He pulled her upright with his free hand and sat her at the edge of the desk, working his fingers in a way he knew would make her shudder. Before long she was wet, and _god_, she was making such sweet noises for him. She rested her head against his shoulder and moaned against his chest as he added a third finger and pressed the spot where he knew her pleasure lay. She squeaked and clung to him when he did it, and he could feel her tightening already.

"Does that feel good?" He murmured in her ear as he worked into her over and over.

She moaned, a feral noise, and he felt her thighs gripping him and cheeks flushed. She was right on the verge.

"Oh, _fuck—_"

Mycroft stopped, and Persephone let out a half-unintelligible stream of swears and tried vainly to roll her hips against him, glaring reproachfully.

Her voice was frayed. "I was _close_!"

"I know." He said. "But I am not done with you yet, Miss Jones."

He grasped a fistful of her hair in his free hand pulled her head back roughly. She gasped.

"Now, I recall asking you a question." He murmured in her ear, his grip on her hair tightening. He could feel her pulse quickening under his touch. "I asked you if it felt good."

"_Yes_." Her voice was low and she looked strung-out on the verge of her orgasm. "Yes, it felt so good. I need more."

He wondered if she'd ever been made to wait before, to obey. He rather doubted that Guthrie possessed the will to overmaster his ungovernable Miss Jones. Maybe he was the first to command her so.

The thought made him impossibly harder, and he was struck by a fierce possessiveness. Only _he_ could make her beg so sweetly, only _he_ could touch her like this.

"Do you want to come?"

She moaned. "_Yes_. _Please_."

He tightened his grip on her hair; "That is not how you ask."

"Sir." She said immediately. "Please, Sir. _Please_."

He rubbed his thumb in slow, agonising circles over her clit.

"_Mycroft_." She almost sobbed in her need, resting her forehead against his chest and clinging to him, writing in her want for friction. "Mycroft _please_, make me come. I want you to make me come."

He rubbed her slowly, languidly, building up a torturous pace which seemed to frustrate her more than anything.

"Tell me how much you want it."

"So much. Fuck. I _need _you, Mycroft. I need you inside me."

"Maybe next time, but only if you're _very_ well-behaved." He said.

She arched up and hissed, and he took note of the exact spot he had touched to cause her to do so.

He was resolved to catalogue every single quirk of this body. He was going to take her apart, first like this, and then again, later, more entirely. Over and over until there wasn't an inch of her he didn't know intimately.

"Can you do that, Jones? Can you be good?"

"Uh-huh."

"I'll have to think about what I'll do to you if you're _not_ good."

Jones let her head fall back in a moan, exposing the pale column of her throat to him in an act of submission and vulnerability that made him want to just _take_ her.

_Not now. Later. _

"Maybe, when you next misbehave, I'll give you a bit of a smack."

Persephone made a keening noise.

"Would you like that, pet?" He let his thumb move in slightly faster circles now. "Would you like me to bend you over my desk and _punish_ you?"

Whimper. "_Fuck..._"

"What was that, pet?"

"It feels so— _uh—_ and your voice is just… _fuck…_"

He could feel her getting close again, and rather doubted that Jones could handle any more teasing for the night. His touch became harder, faster, and she responded immediately with little gasps and choked-off pleas that were half-intelligible at best.

"_Ohmygod_."

She came with a half-sob, back arching in an exquisite and near-unending moment of perfect tension that he drew out for as long as possible.

Then she slumped against his chest, cheeks flushed and boneless. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, limbs heavy, and murmured a muffled something that sounded like "_'mazing…_"

He stroked her hair gently while she caught her breath.

"Perfect." He kissed the shell of her ear and down her neck, a gossamer-light contrast to the hard, controlling touches of moments ago. "You were so perfect. So _good_ for me."

She made a small noise at the praise, head still buried against his shoulder. For a moment or two, he simply allowed her to rest.

Then, he remembered the pretext of their whole encounter, and asked; "Does this answer your initial question?"

"Not asexual." She said in a muffled voice. "Definitely not."

He chuckled, indulging the impulse to tenderly brush a flyaway strand of hair back behind her ear. "If you require further clarification, you could always come home with me tonight."

"Well." Jones sat up in eagerness, her fatigue apparently forgotten. "There are some finer points that need exploring—"

"A shame that you have dinner plans."

Persephone's face fell for a half-second before she came back to herself and fumbled for her phone.

"Just gotta, uh…" She blushed furiously. "Just gotta cancel those."

The corner of his mouth quirked at her commitment to the falsehood, but indulged her in the fiction of cancelling her nonexistent date.

"You do that, Jones."

"And then we'll… we'll go? You really want me to come back with you?"

He felt an impulse to wrap his arms around her and squeeze at the strain of uncertainty in her voice. He fought to keep his tone neutral as he offered a reply;

"Yes." He said. "I want that."

* * *

**A/N:** I'm really particularly keen to hear feedback on this chapter, it was hard to write as I wanted them to get together in a way that made sense for their dynamic and I also wanted the more sexual bits to be in-character but turns out that's hella hard to do. So what worked? What didn't? Please let me know my loves. I don't plan on writing another sex scene in this fic (maybe one more, but I'm not sure yet). If that's something you'd be interested in then let me know. Two more chapters to go! I promise that they will be long and satisfying (insert sexual innuendo here). I have contemplated writing a sequel of this work or perhaps some follow-up oneshots, so let me know what you'd like to see in the future.


	8. Welcome to the Family

Persephone was seeing Mycroft regularly.

Not a word was uttered between them about the particulars of their arrangement — Persephone guessed, based on Mycroft's reaction to her fictitious date with Guthrie, that she was not at liberty to see other people. She hadn't got much further than that; she had no idea if they were just fucking, if _he_ was planning on being monogamous to _her_, if she was supposed to be keeping things a secret… Persephone felt she could fill novels with the things she didn't know about her relationship-type-thing with Mycroft.

She did stay at Mycroft's palatial residence a few times a week "for convenience" — it seemed entirely out of the question that Mycroft would spend any time in her flat, and besides, his place was much closer to the office.

For the most part, Persephone was living out of an overnight bag. She found she didn't mind much; and even though she woke up in a huge, empty bed most mornings, Mycroft always slipped in to bring her a steaming cup of coffee before returning to whatever corner of the house he had retreated to.

She supposed it was the Mycroft Holmes version of an early-morning cuddle.

She'd drink the coffee in bed and then get dressed for the day, and when she finally trudged downstairs — still decidedly not a morning person — she'd eat breakfast at the kitchen counter while Mycroft read the paper from an armchair one room over. Mycroft never seemed to eat much.

"Slows the brain." He had explained once, when she asked. He had not seemed to want to discuss the matter further.

She accepted this. Overall, Mycroft was much kinder to her now that they were… whatever they were. He had even taken to reminding her where she'd left her keys when she inevitably misplaced them — remarkably, without a hint of reproach in his voice.

But their arrangement wasn't without its issues.

It was a rainy Thursday night, and Persephone went home to her flat for the first time in days. She was hanging her wet coat on the hatstand, brushing damp strands of hair out of her face, when she noticed something out the far window.

Frowning, she crossed the room and stared out into the building opposite, where she saw a man.

She stared. He, visibly alarmed that he had been caught peeping, stared back.

Persephone knew this man, knew his face — his pallid skin and thick-knitted brows, the impressive breadth of his shoulders.

Her confusion quickly turned to ire — this man was part of _Mycroft's_ security team.

"He didn't." Her lips parted in an expression of comical surprise. "Oh, he _didn't_."

And so, having been in her flat for a grand total of ten seconds, Persephone crossed back over to the door, put her raincoat back on, and stormed into the night.

Reaching the kerb outside, Persephone shielded her face against the rain with one arm and stuck the other out to flag down a taxi. The rain was bucketing down, now - it was bloody torrential - and she could only just make out the blurry amber of the taxi's _vacant_ sign. She dove into the back seat, cold and wet and irritable.

"Where to, ma'am?"

She gave Mycroft's address. "As quickly as you can, please."

They needed to talk.

* * *

If Mycroft was at all surprised at her storming into his house announced, dripping wet and furious, he did not show it. Indeed, he barely spared a glance in her direction before he went back to reading.

"I am only going to tell you this _once_, Mycroft Holmes—" she said, arms rigid by her sides as she stood before him in his home office — the very image of childish impudence, "—spycraft is not an appropriate way to demonstrate your commitment to— to whatever this is."

Mycroft sighed and marked his page, setting the book aside. "Don't be so dramatic. You are only under category-three surveillance."

She waved her arms in a furiously comical fashion. "Stop surveilling me!"

"No." Mycroft said. "I have instructed Dante to ensure that you are safe. You live in an urban slum, Jones, and you work for the highest echelons of the British government. You must understand that this makes you vulnerable."

It was rational, she had to admit. Entirely too rational to be the whole truth of the matter.

"You just want to know what I get up to when you're not around!" She accused. "You don't trust me."

"I don't need _spies_ to know what you get up to. You are so remarkably transparent, I need only glance in your direction to know every particular of your psyche. Rest assured that you have never succeeded in keeping a secret from me in your life." Mycroft said. "I trust you."

Her reply was sullen; "So basically you only trust me because I'm an idiot who couldn't possibly surprise you."

"_Au contraire_, you are an idiot who constantly surprises me." Mycroft smirked, going back to reading. "I trust you because I know your character — you are not dishonest."

She was still angry, but much of the heat had gone out of it. Now she felt foolish, standing dripping wet in the middle of this very fine room, while Mycroft resolutely ignored her in favour of a novel.

"Well." She said, wincing at the awkwardness of it all. "I should—I should probably go."

"Yes, fine." Mycroft said, not bothering to raise his eyes as he waved a hand to dismiss her. "Of course, you are free to stay — the weather is dreadful."

She glanced at the study window, the glass pane was being hammered by aggressive, unrelenting rain. She really didn't want to venture out again.

"Alright."

"Eat something." Mycroft said, unsurprisingly knowing that she hadn't had dinner yet. "And don't disturb me."

Persephone, heeding the unambiguous dismissal, turned to leave the room. She was barred from leaving, however, by a most unexpected sight.

For, to Persephone's great surprise, she was not to be the only intruder upon Mycroft's privacy that evening.

Sherlock Holmes, fresh from the rain in his great coat, his expression thunderous but strangely composed — burst into the room, followed by an out-of-breath John Watson, who Persephone only knew by reputation.

"Mycroft."

The man in question sighed, setting his book back down again. He looked tired, and mildly exasperated. "Good Lord, can a man not have peace in the sanctity of his own home? Must I be put upon by every idiot in the nation?" He tossed his book aside, directing an irritable quirk of the eyebrow at his brother. "What exactly have you done now, Sherlock?"

"What have I done?" Sherlock muttered, his voice low and eyes narrowed. "The better question, Mycroft, is what have _you_ done? If you had given in to my demands I would never have had to do this."

"Lord, you're not still upset about the Sant-Ruiz business?" Mycroft rubbed his eyes tiredly. "Do what?"

"Why, the unthinkable." Sherlock paused dramatically and held up his mobile phone as though it were a bomb. "I texted mother."

Mycroft paled, and straightened up in his seat — alarm plain on his face. "You didn't."

Sherlock read aloud a text from the phone; "_'Hello Mother, I am pleased to report that both myself and Mycroft are well and will be joining you over Christmas. I will bring John and Mary if convenient, and perhaps it would be prudent to extend the invitation to _**_Mycroft's girlfriend_**_ as well - Persephone Jones. I hear she does not yet have plans for the holiday season. Yours, Sherlock.'_"

He pocketed his mobile and smiled brightly at Mycroft.

Persephone blushed at the implications of his text, and it did not escape her that — if Sherlock's assessment of their relationship was correct — she was the last person to know that she was Mycroft's girlfriend.

Mycroft glowered at Sherlock. "I will exact vengeance for this, little brother, mark my words."

"I will send mother Miss Jones' contact information if you don't give me what I want." Sherlock carried on, indifferent to the threat. "Now, I don't _think_ mother will call without having been properly introduced, but she may well write. You know how she is about traditional post, unwilling to accept its inevitable demise, always nattering on about the romance of letter-writing."

"Sherlock." Mycroft said warningly.

"Or perhaps I will tell mother that Miss Jones is your secretary, and that I fear you are taking advantage of her for sexual gratification." Said Sherlock. "I will be convincing, brother mine. Tell her how worried I am for your soul, and for the poor young lady with her fragile feelings."

"Hey!" Persephone's brows knitted together in confusion. "That isn't—"

"Ignore him, Jones." Mycroft said, eyes never moving from his brother. "He is a mercenary."

Sherlock drew himself up to his full and most impressive height, he glowered down at where Mycroft was sitting, and spoke through gritted teeth; "_Give. Me. The. Address_."

A long silence dangled between the brothers.

At length, it was broken by a sigh from Mycroft.

"Fine."

Sherlock brightened immediately, and called over his shoulder for Mycroft to text this mysterious address to him. As he passed Persephone, he patted her on the shoulder and, smirking, said; "Welcome to the family."

* * *

She didn't want to be ruminating on all that had transpired between Sherlock and Mycroft earlier that evening, but she couldn't quite help it.

She was tucked into bed alongside Mycroft — the twelve-hundred thread count sheets pulled up under her chin snugly as she nestled into the warmth — and she had been staring at him, silently, for a good five minutes.

Mycroft seemed content to ignore her.

She spoke.

"Are you my boyfriend?"

Mycroft turned his attention to her at last, expression bemused. "I am forty-seven. Of course I am not your _boyfriend_."

"Am I your mistress, then?"

Unexpectedly, Mycroft laughed. "Do you honestly imagine you leave me enough energy to pursue yet _another _romantic entanglement?" He said. "I can assure you, Jones, that one woman is quite enough trouble for me."

She felt relief bloom in her chest. "So, we're exclusive, then." She concluded.

"It appears that way." He said dryly.

"You never said, is all." She said, and then asked; "What if I _did _want to sleep around?"

"Then I would wish you the very best of luck in your future endeavors, and I would fire you."

"Again? That seems harsh."

Eventually, Mycroft said; "Nothing is as unforgivable as disloyalty, Jones."

"Okay. Noted." She paused. "Just so you know, I don't plan on being, erm, disloyal."

"I am perfectly aware." Mycroft considered her closely. "I was hoping that you would come away with me over Christmas, actually. To my family home. I was going to ask, even before Sherlock sold me out to mother."

"Oh!" She blinked. "I'm surprised you want me there."

"It would please my parents." Mycroft said by way of explanation, and she supposed that was good enough. "They've never met a girlfriend before, you see. I am obliged to indulge them."

She frowned, confused. "Wait — so I'm a girlfriend, but you're not a boyfriend?"

"You have it in one."

"That hardly seems fair."

"You are almost half my age." Said Mycroft. "Perhaps when you are nearing fifty you will understand the abject humiliation it would cause me to be called 'boyfriend' like some sort of pathetic teenage heartthrob."

"I don't think there's any mistaking you for a teenage heartthrob, no offense. You're balding a bit."

"Wicked woman." He commented mildly, unaffected. "So, will you come?"

"To Christmas? Oh, yeah, sure." She answered easily. "I haven't any family in London. Though my sister is flying in on New Year's Eve — she'll be staying with me for a few weeks."

"Am I expected to…"

"It would be nice if you met her, yeah." She said, tone hopeful. "Just a dinner or something."

"Fine. I shall _reciprocate_." Said Mycroft. "But can we at the very least avoid that abominable slum you insist on calling a dwelling?"

"We can go out for dinner, yes."

"Very well."

"This feels like a high-stakes negotiation, I'm not sure that's ideal." She said. "Isn't this supposed to be the honeymoon period, or something?"

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Would you prefer it if I acted the fool trying to please and coddle you, like other men?"

She smiled, warmly and genuinely. "No. I like you just as you are."

Mycroft stared at her in surprised silence.

"I… thank you."

She kissed his cheek lightly. "You're welcome."

Mycroft turned off the lights and settled into the covers alongside her. Persephone thought that he might have gone to sleep, the pause was so long. Eventually, though, Mycroft's voice drifted across the bed towards her again;

"It isn't easy for me to speak about… things."

"I know."

The sheets rustled as he shifted. "That doesn't bother you?"

"Drives me up the wall sometimes." She said, then softened. "But nobody's brilliant at everything — not even you."

His tone when he replied was almost envious; "you're good at them — _feelings_."

"I suppose I just bothered to practice." She said softly. "I'll never be half as smart as you, though, not if I practiced from dawn till dusk for the rest of my life."

"No." He agreed. "But I don't think that matters, really."

"No?" She asked, tone deceptively casual. "You don't want some brilliant genius woman? Somebody with a PhD, or, you know, a Nobel Peace Prize?"

"No, I don't." He said, seeming to notice the undercurrent of insecurity in her voice. "I… believe I am growing rather fond of you, Jones."

She couldn't hold back a grin. "Good. Me too. Of you, I mean."

Tentatively, she shifted closer to him, and they kissed in the dark. Slow, gentle passes of the lips gave way to fingers caressing faces, and then hands winding around waists and the firm press of bodies against each other.

Mycroft broke away with a slight cough, and said gruffly; "Well, if that's quite all, I think I shall sleep now."

She kissed him again, unperturbed. "Alright." Another kiss. "Goodnight." And another.

Mycroft's fingers traced the curve of her cheek — his touch so light it was almost ghosting. His voice was quiet. "Goodnight."


End file.
